uneblinstu's postgame chatter: vol 13; ed 16 - Illinois

23 minutes ago, Dead Dog Alley said:

 

That is not a good way to look at this.  The referees can decide a game before it starts just by deciding how they are going to call it.  For instance, if Illinois is playing Iowa and the refs decide you can murder somebody before a foul is called, Illinois is going to win.  If they call it tight and don't allow physical play, Iowa is going to win going away.  

 

Similarly to football, if the officials decide they are going to allow a lot of defensive holding in by both sides in a Wisconsin game, Wisconsin will win, because their entire defense is based on holding.  If they call it tight, Wisconsin will lose.  So called "consistent" officiating can still dictate the winner.

 

That aside, the foul called against McGowens down the stretch was just plain awful.  Whether it was due to implicit bias of thinking Dosunmu was the best player in the conference so obviously it was a foul, or if it was done to protect Illinois NCAA seed, that call was still complete shit.

This is where I just don't understand things.

Do you really think the conference gets involved to this level? To tell refs to make sure things go the way of a specific team?  That's the only way I can see "protecting" a team's seed comes in to play. 

If you think a conference can (and does) affect things to this level, I'm not sure why (or how) you can continue to watch college basketball. 

I'm not saying this about you specifically, DDA.  I'm saying this about any watcher of college basketball in general.